Phil Jagielka says the Everton players need to take responsibility for their poor run

Everton captain Phil Jagielka says it is up to the players to take the heat off under-fire manager Roberto Martinez.

A 2-0 defeat at Hull on New Year’s Day made it seven defeats in nine for Everton and four in a row over a miserable festive period.

Martinez guided the club to an impressive fifth place finish last season but they are only 13th at present and just four points above the drop zone.

However, Jagielka says the players are fully behind their boss and need to take responsibility for halting their poor run.

Asked if the manager’s situation was becoming an issue for the players, Jagielka said: “We're massively behind him, I don't think it's come to that point.

"You see pundits, newspapers or social media but things haven't gone from hero to zero in the space of nine games.

"It's not a good place to be right now because, if you were an honest Evertonian, you wouldn't be confident in us keeping clean sheets and you wouldn't be confident in us scoring too many goals.

"That's not a good combination but we've got some good players and some good characters so we need to come to the party.

"At the end of the day we go out there to play and, if we don't pick up results, the manager will take a bit of the blame but the players have to go out there and perform.

"We've got a lot to answer for and the only way we can make it up to the fans is by winning games.”

Everton’s next game is an FA Cup third round tie against West Ham on Tuesday and Jagielka thinks a good result there could kick-start their season.

"There's a lot of stuff for us to sort out but hopefully we can get a result in the FA Cup and that can give us some sort of confidence to take into the league," he said.

"We hope to be a bit happier after West Ham but we need to sort out our league form, which is just not good enough."